We have talked about the foundation of the church, who is the Lord Jesus. Who He is, His life, and His death, and His resurrection, is the foundation stone of the church. You can't have a church without Jesus Christ. You can't have a church without the correct understanding of who Jesus Christ was. Our Lord Jesus, the foundation of the church, is Christ in his perfect life. And the foundation of the church is Christ in his atoning death. And I want to go a little bit further into that this morning. I want to talk to you a little more about the death of Jesus Christ. Be turning with me to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10 in verse number 12 says, But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God, from henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool. For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. Wherefore, whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. For after that, he had said before, this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord. I'll put my laws into their hearts and in their minds. Will I write them? And their sins and iniquities, will I remember no more? Now, where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin. Having therefore brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh. And having an high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering. for he is faithful that promised. And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching." Now, I believe Paul wrote Hebrews, so when I say Paul said, you'll know what I'm talking about. The apostle is giving us I think, three major themes here. He's saying to us that Christ Jesus did the saving work that needed to be done on Calvary's cross. He has, leading up to this passage of Scripture in Hebrews, he has been showing how The new covenant in Christ's blood is better than the old covenant that was in the blood of lambs and bulls. He has showed us that the priesthood of the Lord Jesus Christ in heaven is better than the priesthood of men that was established in the Old Testament. He tells us that that old agreement, that old covenant, has passed away and there is now established a new covenant based upon the work of Jesus Christ on Calvary's cross. The blood of Jesus Christ, the saving work of Jesus Christ, is all that's needed. Verse 12, look at verse 12 again. But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God, from henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool. The blood of Jesus Christ stopped sacrifices. The blood of Jesus Christ stopped sacrifices. There was never a need again for anyone to take a lamb and sacrifice it to God for the remission of their sins. Never. And there is never a need again for men to try in their lives to placate God or to satisfy God or to get God on their side Because the blood of Jesus Christ has reconciled God to the world. God has been reconciled. His blood has paid for the sins of His people. Period. And all the sins of God's people from the time He died until this moment were future. I want to remind you of that. And yet the blood of Jesus Christ wiped every last sin that any child of God will ever commit completely off the slate as far as God is concerned. There's people who really believe that's dangerous doctrine. There are people who really believe that that's scary doctrine because that means people can sin all they want to. Well, if you want to, But doesn't the Lord change your want-tos? Doesn't He give you a desire to do something different? I heard someone talking this morning about wanting to please the Lord. And that's the major desire that happens in a person's life when they get saved. They begin to want to please the Lord. That's about as basic as you get. That's just about as fundamental as you can say it. There is something that happens that makes you no longer have to please yourself ultimately, but now there's somebody else you want to please, and that's the Lord. I really feel sorry. for people who make their wife or their husband their idols? Because idols will fail you. Now we ought to want to please our wives, men. And ladies, you ought to want to please your husbands. That's the truth. And those things are good things. But I tell you what we have to do. We have to please our husbands in relation to the Lord. We have to please our wives in relation to the Lord. He's to be pleased first. You understand that? So God puts a desire to please Him within our hearts. Now, so going back to the first point. Jesus Christ's death on Calvary's cross dealt with our sins. The slate's clean. I've been preaching on the internet a little bit from the book of Romans, and I've been blessed again and again by the truth that God declares righteous ungodly people. If I were to stand before God this morning and He were to hang a sign around my neck that described my standing before Him, the sign would read, perfectly righteous. Somebody said, Brother Mike, you're not perfectly righteous. That's what Paul said. He justifies the ungodly. He doesn't wait till we're godly. He doesn't wait until we're good. He doesn't wait until we're nice enough to save. He doesn't wait until we do a bunch of good works in order to earn His salvation. He declares righteous ungodly people. Now somebody said, but Brother Mike, how can God do that? He's holy, He's pure, He's righteous. How can He say that somebody who is unrighteous is righteous? How can God do that? Well, He does it through the blood of Jesus Christ. The blood of Christ was shed for unrighteous people. Do you understand that the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, walked upon this earth in perfect fellowship with his Father. His spirit was filled with the Holy Spirit. Now, I don't know what you think about when you think about being filled with the Holy Spirit, but love, peace, joy, long-suffering, mercy, meekness, goodness, gentleness, and all the fruit of the Spirit is what I think about when I think about being filled with the Holy Spirit. And our Lord Jesus was flooded with love, joy, peace, long-suffering, meekness, goodness, gentleness, and I never do get all nine of them in there, but I'm telling you, He was flooded He was flooded with that great Spirit of God all the time. One night, he went into a garden, and on every other occasion in his life, he had been in absolute and total control. Storms rage. Sit down. Be quiet. Be still. Demons scream. Come out of him. Devil's rage, it made no difference to him. Men opposed, he said, what was the truth? He said, I always do those things which please my father. And his heart was flooded with joy and love and peace and mercy and grace and all the things full of grace and truth, the Bible says. But he went into a garden. And in that garden, he stared into the depths of a cup that was dark. It was not peaceful, it was chaotic. It was not joyful, it was despairing. It was not happy, it was horrible. He stared into a cup. It was not a cup that was filled with long suffering or meekness or mercy. There was not a drop of mercy in it. He stared into the cup of wrath that was supposed to be lifted to the lips of every last one of us. He stared into that cup of wrath and he hesitated. I always tried to defend the Lord Jesus right there and figure out ways for Him not to really mean what it sounds like He means. But you know, when it comes down to it, He said, not my will. Is there any other way? If there's no other way, not my will, but thine be done. And he walked into that darkness, and into that chaos, and into that despair, and into that bloodletting, and into that destruction, laid himself out on that cross, bled and died as a sinner, forsaken of God, So that you and I would never have to die as sinners forsaken of a holy God. What's the verse say again? It says by this man, but this man after he'd offered one sacrifice for sins. One sacrifice. Hear me this morning, folks. To save you, God doesn't need your good works. To save you, God doesn't need something out of you. He's provided it all in Jesus Christ by one sacrifice. God has provided acceptance for us. And then the Bible says He sat down, He made one sacrifice for sins forever. There'll never be a time when God will need anything from us. And then he sat down on the right hand of God. He was raised from the dead. And he is seated in glory. The man, Christ Jesus, seated in glory. And somebody said, what's he doing in glory? He's waiting until all of his enemies are put completely under his feet. That's what he's waiting on. And by the way, I don't believe that's going to be too far off. For by one offering, verse 14 says, He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. Now this is the basis of the church. If you've come into the church, if you've come into a church by any other route than through the blood of Jesus Christ, you are not really a member of the church. You may have your name on a roll somewhere. You may say I'm a member of such and such church, but unless you've come through the blood, you have not come into the membership of a genuine New Testament church. But if you have come. By that one offering. He has perfected point action. For a little while. Says forever until you sin. No. Until you mess up. No. He has perfected forever them that are set apart for Him. Them that are sanctified. By that one death on the cross, He accomplished the perfection of His people before God. Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. For after that, he hath said before, this is the covenant that I will make with them. After that, after the death of Christ, this is the covenant I will make with them, saith the Lord. After those days, said the Lord, I will put my laws in their hearts and in their minds will I write them, and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now he gives you two things right there. He gives you the reason you don't live like the devil after God saves you is because he writes his law in your hearts. You're not looking at a book anymore saying, well, can I do this? Is it all right, preacher, to dance? Is it okay to go to the hokey joint, preacher? Is it okay? You're not doing that anymore. He's written His laws in your heart. The Word of God is inside of you. You don't have to have somebody to tell you a whole bunch of stuff is wrong. You know it. I mean, the Spirit of the living God lives inside of you. And he writes the Word of God on the inside of you. And you start to do something wrong, and the Spirit of the living God says, don't do that. I had an issue this past week, man. I was out of fellowship with God, and I couldn't figure out why. That can happen sometimes. I couldn't figure out why. And I kept trying to pray, and I couldn't pray. I kept trying to Worked through this thing and I couldn't work through this thing. And I was standing in my study the other night and God spoke to my heart about a specific issue. I can tell you this much. He told me Union Baptist Church is his church, not my church. And when I yielded to him in what he was dealing with me about, sweet fellowship returned. But listen to me closely. That was the law written in my heart. That's the Word of God inside of me. That's the Spirit of God living inside of me. And it's no longer just a book. Thank God for the book. I believe the Bible from cover to cover. I believe all of it's the Word of God. I believe it's true. I believe you can build your life on the Word of God. But God puts that Bible in your heart. He puts the Bible inside of you. And then it becomes a living Word. It's a spiritual Word. It's the truth of God that lives inside of you. Now, I'm going to tell you something. You start hearing stuff that's not in this written book, you better watch out. That's not God. But hear me, He does put His laws in your heart. And then He says, there are sins and iniquities I forget. I remember no more. Now, actually, there's a little difference between forgetting and remembering no more. If you forget something, it might be because you're absent minded. Now, kids, let me tell you something, young people, let me tell you something, you're not experiencing this right now, you're not experiencing this right now, but you will experience this. You will experience getting up from the table. And going into another room to do something and get in the other room and have to stand there and think, why did I come in here? And most of the time, you'll have to go back to the table and sit down to remember why you were going in there to begin with. That's not happening to you yet, but it will. Do I have a witness? I have a pretty good witness here. Well, God's not absent-minded. He doesn't forget our sins just because He loses His ability to remember them. You know, I'll tell you what, that sin you committed was a long time ago, and I can't remember that anymore. No, no, no. He chooses not to remember our sins. By the way, can I tell you something rabbit right there? Wouldn't it be good if we'd choose not to remember people's sins against them? Wouldn't that be a good thing, don't you think? Don't you think that'd be kind of Christ-like? I mean, whether they've asked us to forgive them or not, forgive them or not. Would that be good if we just forgive them and remember their sins against them no more? And especially if they confess their sins to you and ask you to forgive them, wouldn't it be really good if you could just put it out of your minds? Make a choice. God said, I remember their sins no more. There are people who are living in family situations and the husband hasn't been faithful and the wife can't get over it. Or the wife hasn't been faithful and the husband can't get over it. Or the children have been just devils and the family can't get over it. I'll tell you what you better do. Get over it. Get over it. You can forgive! Because God forgives, you can forgive. Well, Brother Mike, I can forgive, but I can't forget. You can if you choose to. How do you deal with temptation? How do you deal with temptation? Here's how you deal with temptation. You sit down and you think about it and you wonder if you could get by with it. Huh? No? Am I not preaching right? I'll tell you how you deal with temptation. You say, oh, God, help me put this out of my mind. And then you, by the grace of God, put it out of your mind. Well, some of you are tempted not to forgive. You don't see it as temptation. Can I tell you, God is not a grudge holder. And he's calling us not to be grudge holders. He's calling us to forgive one another. I don't suppose there's a greater sin. I don't suppose there's a greater betrayal of faithfulness. I guess there's a greater insult, a greater betrayal of trust than infidelity in a family. I don't suppose there's any greater betrayal of trust and that. But I want to tell you something, my friend. All of us have been that unfaithful bride to Jesus. We have been the unfaithful one to Jesus Christ. And He says, I'll choose not to remember your sins against you anymore, ever. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. That's what His work has accomplished. And the church is built on that. Boy, I tell you, I know churches that are just split right and left and fight and fuss all the time because people won't forgive one another. And the church is built on the forgiveness of God in Christ Jesus. Wherefore, the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us, for after that he hath said before, this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts. He says, and their minds will I write them, and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now, where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin. Boy, I saw something in this the other day. He says in verse 19, verse 18, where remission of sins is, there's no more offering for sin. Are you hearing me? You don't come to God anymore trying to give Him some kind of offering for your sins. When you've believed on Christ, He is the remission of your sins. But verse 26 says, if we sin willfully after we've received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins. And that whole section is about people who profess to know Jesus Christ, and yet they turn on Him. So there's two situations where there's no remission of sins. There's no remission of sins if your sins are already remitted in the blood of Christ. You don't need another one. And there is no remission of sins if you turn from Christ. Christ is our only salvation. Christ is our only salvation. So. In light of that, how is the church supposed to operate? Christ. His blood is the foundation, one of the foundational truths of the church. God's forgiveness of sin is a foundational truth of the church. The inner witness and work of the Holy Spirit is a foundational truth of the church. So in light of those things, how is the church supposed to operate? Well, listen to what he says. Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. Wow. Let me let me just stop there for a minute. having boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. Can you imagine how that must have sounded to Jewish ears? When Jesus died, the veil in the temple was ripped from the top to the bottom. I mean, that thing was really, really heavy. That was a heavy curtain, ripped from the top to the bottom, signifying that the way into the Holy of Holies was now made open. Do you know, in all those years until Jesus came, on the Day of Atonement, and only on the Day of Atonement could the high priest go into that Holy of Holies. Now, listen to what he had to go through. He was set aside for a week before he ministered in the Holy of Holies. He had to be by himself. He had to cleanse his mind. He had to pray. He had to seek God. The night before, he had to wash, put on pure white garments, and get ready for the ceremony. He goes to the temple, all the people crowding in, and behind the screen, there's a screen there, and first he offers a sacrifice for himself. Then he goes behind the screen and he washes real good, got blood all over him, washes real good, and then he puts on pure white garment skin. Then he goes and offers a sacrifice for the rest of the priests. And then he's got to put on, he's got to go back behind the screen, wash real good, and the people are just watching in anticipation, this man's going before God for them. And then he goes, he washes, he puts on pure white, and he takes that lamb back in there, another lamb back into the Holy of Holies, and there he offers it before God for the people. And only once a year. And he's got to go with blood in his hands. Can you imagine what it must have sounded like to a Jew to hear this man say, now, all of us can crowd into the Holy of Holies. You're washed in the blood of the Lamb. You don't need to put on pure white garment. We don't need a priest to go in there for us. He's already in there. Now come with boldness and enter into the Holy of Holies. My goodness, if that's not an exhortation of prayer, I don't know what is. If that's not an exhortation to fellowship with God, I don't know what is. If that's not an opportunity, if that's not saying all the others passed away, Johnny, you can go in. You can go in. I can go in. We can go in by the blood of Jesus Christ. Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest. By the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh. And having a high priest over the house of God, let us draw near. Let us draw near with full, with a true heart, in full assurance of faith. Don't hold back. Pull up close, snuggle up, draw near. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering. Don't ever doubt Him. Don't doubt that you can't go to God. Do not doubt that God won't help you in your situation. Do not doubt that God will not come to you and minister to you and see you through and carry you through and help you and heal you. Don't doubt that. Don't doubt that. Here's what the church looks like. Let us consider one another. to provoke, to love, and to good works. That word provoke. I've got an old walking stick that I carry around with me when I do my walking. Well, they're good for snakes. And they're good to keep Maggie off of me when she wants to jump on me. Walking sticks. They also help you when you're off balance, you know. When I see that word provoke, I think of the word poke. I had my walking stick this morning and I'd poke you a little bit. You think that'd provoke you? After a while you'd say, oh my, quit poking me! I'll tell you what, that's the reaction God's looking for. It's a paroxysm. He said, get each other stirred up about helping one another and loving one another. Provoke one another to love and good works. That's what the church is about. That is what the church is about. You know why most of us are so stinking unhappy? It's because we're so stinking self-centered. We don't have our minds on anybody else. We don't have our minds on helping anybody else. We just keep walking around wondering why we're not happy. Why can't I be happy? We'll go sit for an hour with somebody in a nursing home. Why can't I be happy? Go help somebody. Go find somebody that's new in the community. Do something for somebody else. Provoke one another unto love and to good works. That's what the church is about. Camp meeting we used to go to got all involved in one another's. One another's, they called it. And the Bible talks about there's a whole bunch of one another's. Love one another, exhort one another, pray for one another, and so forth. And they would encourage one another by giving each other gifts. But I tell you, it's so much bigger than that. It's so much bigger than that. If I'm in sin, you ought to rebuke me. That's a one another. If you're discouraged, I want to try to encourage you. That's a one another. And what we were doing here this morning, you see, the reason we don't care about time around here is because I believe what we were doing this morning is what church is about. Church is not just about a preacher or hearing a sermon. Church is about exhorting one another. I heard an exhortation about God's sovereignty this morning. I heard an exhortation about God's caring about your life this morning. I've heard several exhortations. The rest of us ought to tune in. Well, get those big antennas, you know, and tune in, because God might be speaking to you. That's what the church is about. That's why he calls us together. Listen, can you see how much difference that is in a guy who says, well, I can worship God down on the creek bank as good as I can over at that church house? Well, unless the fish come up and exhort you. Unless the worms in your can rebuke you. You're not going to get a whole lot of help down there. But I tell you, among God's people, there's help, there's strength here, there's blessedness here, there's encouragement here. That's why I encourage you not to be gone just as soon as the service is over. Stand around, help one another. It might not be you that needs to help. Somebody might need help from you. That's what the church is about. We're looking for the New Testament church, and that's what the church is about. You say, Brother Mike, how do I have the right to exhort anybody? How do I have the right to rebuke anybody? How do I have the right to help anybody? How can I help anybody? Because of the blood of Jesus Christ, because of what He's made you, because of what He's called you, what He's gifted you with, and what He's enabled you to do. That's the reason, and that's what the church is about. That's it. That's what the church is about. I thank you for doing what you do. And I want to encourage you to continue to do that. By the way, we do that on Sunday afternoons, too, and Wednesday nights. Somebody said, y'all got more religion than I got. Well, I hope not. I'm not here for religion. But I tell you what, I'd rather be here than at a ballgame. I'd rather be here than eating in a restaurant down in Paducah. Am I meddling yet? I'd rather be here than at a family outing. I'm aiming for their hearts. I'm not aiming for their toes. I'd rather be among God's people than to be with any other family member I've got. I'm glad I can count my mama as God's people, but I'm just saying. This is the family of God. It's what the church is. It's what the church is about. We're about a whole lot more than this. But this is what the church is about. Father, I pray this morning you'd take the message and just continue to help us and exhort us and teach us and show us your will and your ways. Oh, God, you've helped us so much. You've done so much for us. And Lord, we want more. Not just because we're selfish, but Lord, we believe more glorifies you. And that's what we want. We want you to be glorified. Thank you, Father, for the attention this morning. Thank you, Lord, for the help of your spirit today. We pray you continue to teach us and help us today. In Jesus name. Amen. I just want you to know.